Inside Turn

The fourth wall.

Where to start…

Last week I went to see a play that a friend produced, and it made me think about the constructs that we create to sheild ourselves from unpleasant realities (or things that we think are realities).  It’s easy to hide behind a persona or “play the game”, especially when surrounded by those who support your efforts, knowingly or not.

Afterwards I went to salsa with new eyes.  It was like I was viewing everything through a television frame,  people acting out larger-than-life roles, adopting personas that would be total caricatures out on the streets among normal people.  And all the drama!  More than one person I know has compared to being in high school all over again, except with more alcohol.  Or not, depending on what high scool you went to, but anyway…

Then I realized something.  This may sound trite, cliche, or even just plain obvious, but it’s all I was seeng because it’s all that I was looking for.  Personally, I could never really pull off the act, but I’ve certainly tried more than once.  Maybe that made me more sensitive to those who could join the “scene” so much more naturally.  And why was I even trying to be like them?  Because it was easier, and safer, than just being myself?  Because I wanted to fit in with the cool kids?

I go to dance, not to be seen dancing.  I’ve spent years learning and practicing and thinking about connection and experimenting with new ideas and finally developing my own style.  I’m not going to throw that away to go swim in the shallow end of the pool.  There are plenty of other people who go for the same reason I do and hanging with them will be much more rewarding.  And if I go looking for them, I will find more of them than I expected.

I will grant you that part of salsa, and maybe dancing in general is about performance and showing off.  The question becomes:  Who are you when the music stops?

Posted in Dance | 2 Comments »

Learning to Fall

I haven’t written anything about it until now, but I started going to a climbing gym not too long ago.  I’m a beginner, so I’m still working on basic climbing technique, but I’ve gone up the wall more than once now.

I’m still pretty timid.  If I don’t feel really secure on a handhold or foothold I have a hard time making the next move up.  Two different people who I have climbed with have told me the same thing:  “That’s because you haven’t taken a fall yet.”

Now, the gym is totally safe.  I’m in a harness, and the rope is certainly going to hold.  Intellectually, I know this, but when you are halfway up a vertical surface, that isn’t very reassuring.  I was thinking that the next time I go, I need to fall on purpose a few times.  Just let go and trust the rope.  Maybe then I will be willing to push myself more.

After thinking about it some more, I realized there was more to it.  It’s not only that I could fall, it’s that someone could see me fall.  In some ways, that is worse.  Failing in public is not something I am comfortable with.  It’s amazing I stuck with salsa as long as I did.  It’s probably only because I didn’t fully realize how bad I was until I got better.  It’s certainly made learning other dances more difficult, since now I know how much of a beginner I am, and I have this aversion to “being caught” doing something wrong.

But back to climbing…  Even a deliberate fall is probably going to be ok, because “I meant to do that”.  It’s a good step in the right direction, but it’s not the answer.  Even if I’m not sure I can do the move, I have to try it anyway.  If I never push my limits, I won’t know where they are.

I can also see other aspects of my life where I haven’t really pushed myself to take risks for the same reason.  Fear of failure has probably cost me more opportunities than I know.  “Well, duh”, some of you are probably saying.  It seems so obvious now.  I think I always knew it at some level, but it’s not a place where I want to be any more.

Posted in General | 2 Comments »

I know, it’s another video.

But I can’t help it. I have just discovered the greatest thing on the internet.

Edit: Found a version that didn’t use such an annoying flash player?

Posted in General | 1 Comment »

A small revision.

After reading the comments on my last post and thinking about it a bit more, I realized that I may have overstated a bit.

This may be a better way to put it.  The feet should move *in reaction* to where the body is moving.  If, as a follow, you are doing full weight transfers, the free leg will be ready to go in any direction as needed.  At that point, the step will be a little ahead of the body so that the weight transfer onto it will be smooth.  If you are stepping short in order to stay right underneath your center, it will affect your ability to move smoothly.

The responsibility for the lead is the same.  Be clear in your direction and solid in your timing when leading the follow through movement across the floor.  With timing and direction, you really don’t need force!

As a side note, these are all theories I have come up with based on my experience on the dance floor and various workshops and classes I have attended.  It’s been great getting some alternative viewpoints from follows.  Please keep coming back wth comments, and if you are looking for a soapbox, the floor is open!  I am more than happy to post some guest editorials.

Posted in Dance | 3 Comments »

No deep thoughts tonight.

Just something I found on the interwebs.

Posted in Tango | 1 Comment »

Feet first?

I’ve been finding that my experiences at salsa on Mondays are giving me a lot to write about.  Here’s another one.

Many beginning salsa dancers are told to step forward on 1 and back on 5, and vice versa for the follows.  While technically correct, what isn’t usually communicated is *why* this is so.

There are two ways to think about.  This first is to move the feet in the directions you are going and then let your body catch up.  This is really the wrong way to think about it for several reasons.  First it leads to taking big steps, especially big back steps, which is a major cause of accidents and injuries on the dance floor.  (Another one is flying elbows, but that’s another topic.)  Second, stepping forward or backwards on certain counts is more of a guideline than a rule, but once you take that step, you are committed, and if you were supposed to move a different direction, it’s too late.  Third, what if you need to make a side step for some reason?

All of these things can be fixed if you take the opposite approach.  Your *body* moves the desired direction first, and your feet move underneath you to keep you from falling.  Now you aren’t taking big steps because you are keeping your feet underneath you.  If, as a follow, you are being moved in an unexpected direction, you are now more equipped to handle it gracefully.  You can just shift your weight in time with the music and let your feet go where they need to go.

This gives leads some extra responsibility.  If you want the follow to step forwards or backwards, you have to actually *move* their body.  In order to do that, you will need to move *your* body in the direction you want them to go.  If you lead with your feet, you are very likely going to kick a follow who is keeping their feet underneath them

This is the secret to moving together smoothly in closed position.  One of the first places I heard it articulated clearly was in a West Coast Swing workshop given by Miles Cunningham and Tessa Munroe, two phenomenal WCS dancers.  I found a clip of them that illustrates it perfectly.

Posted in Dance | 3 Comments »

Connection

One of the things that I find important for a good dance is “connection”, but what exactly does that mean?  I’ve been thinking about it a bit the past few days, and I’ve come up with a few different ways of looking at it.

Connection with your partner - This is what people normally think of.  It can mean the physical connection, by which you are communicating lead and follow, but it can also mean something a little more intangible.  I’ve heard it referred to as “dance chemistry”.  There are just some people you will have a better dance with, and it isn’t always about skill level or how many cool combinations you pull off.

Connection with the floor -  I remember “rediscovering the floor” at one point after switching from some thick- soled practice shoes that I had using for a while to some standard ballroom shoes.  Being able to feel the floor made a huge difference to the confidence of my steps.  It’s so important in tango, that it is often referred to as the third partner in the dance.   After taking tango, I’ve found that I can be much more grounded and feel more stable because I am more aware of my connection with the floor.

Connection with the music - Sometimes people forget that we are dancing to more than a metronome.  Music has phrasing, peaks and valleys, hits and breaks.  Even if you are hearing the song for the first time, a good sense of how phrasing works will allow you to tailor the dance to the music.  It’s even possible to react spontaneously to things that you hear if you allow yourself the flexibility.  This is something that takes a bit of time to build, both for the familiarity with the style of music you are dancing to and the ability to “think on your feet” while dancing.

All three of these concepts are very important for a good dance.  Which one ends up being the most important depends on the what you are dancing to and who you are dancing with.

Posted in Dance, Salsa, Tango | 4 Comments »

Double feature.

Two great tastes that go great together.

Video games are a risky business.  These days it takes a substantial investment of resources for a company to produce a commercial level game.  As a result, most big game studios take few risks, sticking to the game play types that have been proven to be successful in the past.  As a result you get a ton of derivative first-person shooters, real time strategies, etc.

Every once in a while you will get some creative hybrids.  One of the prime examples for 2007 was Puzzle Quest, a game that took the match-3 mechanics of Bejewelled and integrated it with a basic RPG system.  They took a creative risk and ended up with a sleeper hit that started on the PlayStation portable and Nintendo DS and ended up being ported to just about every game console out there.

A second example is Culdcept Saga.  Every review I have read describes it as “Monopoly meets Magic: The Gathering”.  And really, I can’t think of a better way to describe it.  You roll dice and move along a continuous game board and claim territories by placing creatures on them.  If you land on an occupied square you have the choice of doing battle with the creature occupying the square rather than paying the rent.  (If you lose or tie, you still pay the rent.)  Battle is done through the cards that you currently have in your hand, and you get to customize your draw deck between scenarios.

The game incorporates all of the deck building and random draw mechanics of collectible card games, but I don’t have to buy booster packs?  Sold!

Would you like fries with that?

So last week I decided to break down and pick up Culdsept Saga for myself, after having played the demo and seeing the full game at a friends house.  In order to save some money, I decided to take advantage of a local software store’s questionable trade-in policies.

Apparently bringing in games to trade-in makes me a prime candidate for an up-sell.  In addition to the usual pre-order spiel, I was offered the chance to spend 15$ to save X% on used game purchases and get an extra percentage back on trade-ins.  I declined and started trying to tell me what a deal I was missing out on.

I already have mixed feelings about the whole trade-in business model.  Please don’t try to milk even more money out of me for the privilege of feeling like I have to support it in order to “make my money back”.  In addition, once I have said no, please respect my decision and don’t keep trying to talk me into it.  Considering I’m on the fence about the trade-in thing anyway, making it an unpleasant experience is going to discourage me from doing it again.

To be fair, the guy was just doing his job, and I was very civil with him because of that.  This sort of behavior is mandated from very high up the chain, and I am sure that he gets tracked on how many of these things he sells.  It’s sad that this is how the corporate level treats their customers.  The guys on the front lines get to take all the crap for it.

It makes me wonder which is worse, working for GameStop or working as a games tester.

Posted in Games | No Comments »

Better 1 or Better 2?

On of the big debates is salsa is on-1 vs on-2.  It can be a topic of heated discussion.  On-1 has the reputation of being very rough and jerky.  On-2, which is currently in favor with most of the professional performers,  is supposed to be much smoother.  I’m primarily an on-1 dancer, but I stopped being a rough lead a long time ago, so I’ve been thinking about where these opinions came from.

First, a *very* basic discussion of the salsa basic.  Given eight counts of music, both dancers are stepping on count 1-2-3 and 5-6-7.  There is a pause on counts 4 and 8 where no step is taking place, although there can be a slow weight shift.  It’s important to note that this is same for both on-1 and on-2.  The difference between the styles comes from which counts you move forward and back on.  I’m going to skip that for now.

For beginners, On-1 tends to be about the wind up.  1-2-3 is where the prep takes place for a follow’s turn to the right (an outside turn) or a cross-body lead.  The actual move doesn’t start until count 5, which means that in addition to the three prep counts, you have a *long* count 4 to wait through.  There are lot’s of things that can go wrong here, but that is a topic for later.  The point is that it can give the dance a feeling of “stop and go” or “hurry up and wait”.  Worse if the lead is too forceful and/or too early, especially on the cross-body, it can pull the follow off balance, which is very unpleasant.

With on-2, one of the general concepts is: “well, as long as you are going that way…”  There isn’t a lot of prep time.  Instead the lead uses and re-directs the follow’s natural momentum.  For example, since the follow is already stepping forward on beat 2, why not lead them to continue in that direction until they reach the the other end of the slot?  There’s your on-2 cross-body lead without any of the on-1 push and pull.  It’s also fairly easy to add some rotational force to start them turning as they are traveling forward.

There’s nothing that says that on-1 has to be rough. It’s just that it’s what a lot of beginners start with, and they are going to be rough no matter what the count is.  It takes a while to learn that it takes very little energy to lead a move, if applied properly.  It’s entirely possible to apply the same concepts of redirecting momentum with on-1 as with on-2.  It just isn’t as integral to the style.

Note:  I am sidestepping the whole issue of which style is more aligned with the music.  Some songs feel like they should be danced on 1. Others feel like they should be danced on 2.  Some day, I will be able to do both.

Posted in Salsa | 1 Comment »

Same Old Song and Dance.

It’s a double post Monday!

In social dancing, leads are always trying to learn new moves.  That’s because while follows get the sometimes dubious benefit of experiencing different leads throughout the night, the leads are doing their same set of combinations every dance.  All night.

By the end of the night tonight, I was honestly tired of my own moves, which doesn’t happen often.  It actually started building up last week when I got to look at some videos of my dancing.  I started noticing that it was getting a bit repetitive.  “Oh look, there’s that combination again.”

Now there’s nothing really wrong with that.  Every lead has a bag of tricks, and some people have bigger bags than others, but very few if any leads are going to be able avoid repeating themselves over the course of the night.  Still at some point, it feels a little stagnant.

I thought about it a bit on the drive home, and I think I have a plan for Thursday.  First of all, I need to simplify.  At some point, all the complicated turn patterns start getting in the way of simply dancing to the music.  I think I’ve boiled it down to three or four concepts that I want to build around.  It may not sound like much, but something as basic as a cross-body outside turn can be done so many different ways that there is still room for variety.  Plus, whether it’s a single, double or just an easy half turn changes the feel of the move significantly.

(At this point, many of the non-dancers in the audience are tuning out.  Sorry guys.)

I also think I have drifted too far into some sort of salsa-tango fusion and I think I need to pull it back a bit.  I know I’ll hear about it if I eliminate it completely, (You know who you are) but currently it’s being over-utilized.

Anyway, it’s time to shake things up a bit.  Maybe drag out some old moves that I haven’t used in a while and re-invent myself a bit.  Sounds like fun. 

Posted in Salsa | 2 Comments »